


Past Tense

by aterribleinfluence



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-14
Updated: 2019-01-14
Packaged: 2019-10-10 07:00:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17421227
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aterribleinfluence/pseuds/aterribleinfluence
Summary: ‘In truth, he had been nervous of doing this, afraid it would open up old wounds. Perhaps expose more than either of them wanted. But Abby had wanted this. And he couldn’t resist the draw of the idea either, the chance to work off some of that old...antagonism. To fulfil a few long held fantasies....’Prompt: ‘season 3/4 kabby roleplaying season 1 kabby’ (from the kabby kink meme ages ago, but this one just wouldn’t leave me alone until I wrote it)(set in some nebulous AU where Arkadia isn’t destroyed and there’s no Praimfaya, just don’t think too much about it)





	Past Tense

* * *

 

She’s wearing the coat.

He had expected the braid – in truth, that was an embarrassingly large part of why he’d agreed to this. Marcus has always liked Abby’s hair in a braid. But he hadn’t even known she still _had_ the old blue coat she used to wear; the one just a little too big for her slender frame, that billowed around her like a cape when she rushed off to deal with some medical emergency. It had been standard issue for doctors on the Ark, but it always felt like such an intrinsic part of Abby Griffin as a person that Marcus finds his breath catches in his throat when he sees her wearing it again. It’s as if by opening the door to the Chancellor’s quarters – a place he practically lives himself now – he has opened a door to the past.

That, of course, being the point.

Still, it’s startling how much it affects him to see Abby like this again, the way she looked for most of their long acquaintance. The ring she used to wear around her neck is notable in its absence; they had talked about that, but neither of them had felt comfortable with the idea of Abby wearing it again, not for this. Other than that, she looks exactly how he remembers from the Ark. Councillor Griffin in the flesh.

Complete with the expression of dislike and barely masked impatience she always used to wear when having to deal with him.

“What do you want, Kane?” she says.

For an instant, even though he has been expecting it, the use of his last name causes a tiny stab of pain in his chest. He shrugs off the sensation, closing the door behind him with a sharp snap, not a slam, but enough to instantly command attention. He’d spent a lifetime learning how to do that; the way to stand, the way to walk, the way to speak so that people will listen. The old movements come back to him surprisingly easily, muscle memory.

“To talk,” he says shortly. “I thought we could manage that without biting each other’s heads off, at least.”

“Fine.” Abby folds her arms. “So talk.”

He doesn’t let his eyes flicker down to her chest, though she must know damn well the effect crossing her arms like that has on her cleavage. That’s something he remembers training himself out of too. Abby is less successful, her eyes skimming quickly over him, taking him in as he approaches.

Marcus didn’t really have to change much. Finding an old worn black jacket similar enough to the one he used to wear. Pushing his hair back. For him, shaving his beard off was the strangest part; it’s only a very recent acquisition really, in the grand scheme of his life, but already he feels strangely exposed without it. He has dodged questions from others about why he made the sudden change back to clean shaven with mixed success, but when he looks into a mirror he can see it’s certainly been effective in turning the clock back. He recognises his old self easily, as he might an old friend who he hasn’t seen in a while.

It doesn’t take much, really, for either of them to become again the people they were on the Ark. It reminds Marcus of how short a time it really has been. A disconcerting thought.

In truth, he had been nervous of doing this, afraid it would open up old wounds. Perhaps expose more than either of them wanted. But Abby had wanted this. And he couldn’t resist the draw of the idea either, the chance to work off some of that old... _antagonism_. To fulfil a few long held fantasies.

“Well?” says Abby. She’s looking noticeably impatient, all but tapping her foot as she waits for him to explain himself. But then, he knows instinctively that he would have deliberately kept her waiting not so long ago, just to irritate her. “What’s this about?”

“Amendment 206,” he says. “I want you to change your vote.”

He sees a flicker of surprise in her eyes, quickly hidden. They hadn’t talked about this part, hadn’t really decided what the pretext for this...encounter would be. Perhaps she had thought he’d make something up, but Amendment 206 was a real law, a real battle they had fought with each other, some years ago. One of the very few he had ended up winning, as it happens.

“No,” says Abby bluntly. “You don’t need my vote and I have no intention of giving it to you. Are we done?”

“Enforcement would be easier if the vote were unanimous...”

“I’m sure it would,” said Abby. “The answer is still no.” She glares at him, in a way she hasn’t done in a long time, all fire and defiance and that maddening, effortless superiority. Marcus feels the familiar flare of annoyance at her wilful stubbornness, but the other thing stirs to life deep inside him too – the strange thrill that always came from pushing her buttons, gearing up for a fight. It’s shameful to think that’s he’s _missed_ this, but he has, just a little.

“There’s no point to voting against on principle,” he says. “All it does is weaken the Council’s position.”

“ _Your_ position, you mean,” says Abby. “And if you think there’s no point in having principles, Kane, that’s your prerogative, but that doesn’t mean I have to agree.”

Marcus releases a sharp breath of irritation. She’s good at this, always has been. Twisting his words, turning him into the bad guy. Because Councillor Abigail Griffin is _always_ right, of course, and anyone who believes otherwise is simply misinformed. That unyielding self-confidence is something he can’t help but admire about her, as much as it infuriates him.

_Used_ to infuriate him, that is. The mindset of his past self is creeping up on him when faced with this past version of Abby. It’s difficult to keep them both in his mind at the same time; the woman he loves beyond description, and the one who is currently standing in front of him, arms crossed, stubbornly refusing to listen to a single goddamn word he says.

He tries a different tack.

“You know as well as I do that this is a necessary step,” he says. “Be reasonable, Abby. The trade in illegal and restricted good hurts everyone on the Ark, it allows a criminal class to flourish and exploit others. With the power to make random inspections, we can finally take down those who we know are the worst offenders but have made themselves untouchable through lack of proof.”

Abby is shaking her head even before he finishes speaking. “No,” she repeats. “You’re going too far, as usual. The ends do not always justify the means Kane, I don’t know why I keep having to have this argument with you!”

He opens his mouth to retort, but she cuts him off:

“I won’t defend what Nygel does,” she says. “I don’t like the black market any more than you do. But you know most people have _some_ form of contraband in their quarters somewhere. Things that don’t hurt anyone. If you go looking for trouble...”

“People with nothing to hide have nothing to fear,” interrupts Marcus firmly.

Abby glares at him. “This isn’t a police state. You can’t just go barging into people’s homes on a whim!”

“No, we can’t. That’s why the law needs to change. So that we have the power to weed out those who flout the rules behind closed doors. Who use their _privilege_ to escape punishment.”

“Oh!” Abby lets out a little breath of laughter that doesn’t sound amused at all. “So that’s what this is all about? This isn’t about changing the law, this is about _me_.”

He lets the corner of his mouth lift a little, a carefully patronising smirk. “Not everything is about you, Abby.”

“That’s rich, coming from the man who’s constantly on my back, waiting for me to slip up, waiting for the chance to—”

Marcus feels a flicker of half forgotten anger, and cuts in sharply: “Deliberately breaking the law is not ‘slipping up’,” he says. “If anyone else had done the things you have over the years, you know what would have happened. You barely get a slap on the wrist.”

Abby steps forward angrily. “You want to see me floated!” she says.

That hits a little too close to home. It’s not the first time someone has made that accusation of him. “What I _want_ is to see you face some goddamn consequences for your actions for once in your life!” he snaps.

“Oh is _that_ what you want?” says Abby. “Is that why you’re always double checking my reports, making excuses to inspect Medical...intimidating my colleagues...tracking my movements...” She’s uncomfortably close to him now, glaring up at him. “You _knew_ you already had the vote on lockdown, but you came here anyway, even though you knew I would never change my mind. But you just had to rub it in my face, didn’t you?”

She’s breathtaking in her sudden fury, her chest rising and falling rapidly, her dark eyes glittering with anger. She hasn’t looked at him like this in a long time, and Marcus is suddenly, startlingly aware of how turned on he is. It’s perverse, undeniable. His heart is pounding and every nerve in his body is tingling with anticipation.

“You don’t care about justice, you just want to see me _lose_ ,” Abby snarls. “You want to see me lose because you can’t stand that you can’t control me. Because I’m not afraid of you and it drives you _crazy_.”

She reaches out suddenly and cups the bulge between his legs that he had been hoping like hell she hadn’t noticed. He’s straining against his pants, and when her hand slides firmly against the hard ridge of his erection, he feels a jolt of arousal so intense it almost brings him to his knees.

“What the hell are you doing?” He means the words to be angry, but they come out as something more of a gasp.

“Giving you what you _want_ ,” Abby says, her eyes blazing as she refuses to break his gaze. “You think I’m naive, Kane, but I’m not blind. I _see_ the way you look at me.”

“I—” Her hand is working steadily between his legs, and it’s becoming difficult to think. “I don’t—”

“I’m sick of you acting like this isn’t personal,” she says. “You think I don’t know what this is really about? You _like_ fighting me because deep down you _like_ losing control.”

She squeezes him through the thick material of his pants and Marcus has to bite back a groan. He’s not far off from losing control right now, his anger shot through with desperate arousal, the adrenaline from their fight already flooding his veins and making him dizzy with urgent, nameless need. Fight, flight or...

Abby’s face is inches from his own, her lips curled with contempt.

“I know you want me,” she says, her voice low and dangerous, effortlessly seductive. “Just admit it.”

He can hardly deny it with the evidence swelling and straining against her hand, so he says nothing. He can feel the heat of her body, so close to his.

“I know you’ve imagined this,” says Abby. “Throwing me up against a wall, bending me over the Council table. I know you’ve sat there glaring at me, thinking about what it would be like...”

He isn’t able to just let _that_ pass by. “Those are some very specific fantasies, Abby,” he growls. “Seems like I’m not the only one who’s imagined it.”

“You’re so full of it, Kane.”

He barks a laugh. “You would know.”

She steps back, abruptly, letting her hand drop. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

Marcus tries to ignore the sudden, devastating absence of her touch. He’s breathing very hard, his blood pounding through his veins, but he still manages to infuse his voice with condescension.

“Typical,” he says. “You can’t even admit it to yourself. It drives _you_ crazy, doesn’t it? Knowing that you can never charm your way round me like you do everyone else. Knowing I’m not _impressed_ by you – the faultless, beautiful, brilliant Councillor Griffin. Knowing you want me anyway and _hating_ yourself for it.”

There’s too much truth in this now, even if it’s truth of another time, and there’s a voice in the back of his head that’s telling him he’s going too far, pushing too hard, but he’s drunk on the release of words he held in for so long and can hardly stop himself. He leans in close.

“It must really put a crimp in your perfect little world,” he whispers in her ear, soft and confidential, quietly mocking. “Because you _always_ get what you want, don’t you Abby?”

She shoves him away, just a little, but when he looks down into her eyes it’s not just anger he sees there, it’s something darker, more primal. Marcus feels a flicker of real triumph. He’s got under her skin, and for once she seems to have no easy response. He leans down, so close he can almost taste her sharp, staccato breaths. Colour is rising on her cheeks, staining her collarbones. His hands caress her hips, possessive rather than tender.

“Tell me what you _want_ , Abby,” he says, in a low, taunting voice.

“Go fuck yourself, Kane,” she whispers.

He kisses her instead, clashing his mouth against hers, taking her hard, urgently. She whimpers into his mouth and her arms clasp around his shoulders, hands tangling into his hair as she kisses him back. Marcus lets out a deep moan of satisfaction from the back of his throat; his hands move from her hips to the curve of her ass, pulling her flush against him with a rough movement. They stumble, fiercely entwined, until Abby’s back hits the wall and he presses her against it, caging her in, revelling in every soft curve of her body pressed against him.

Caught up in the moment, he almost forgets that they’ve done this before. Of course he has kissed Abby, but never like _this,_ never with this reckless passion shot through with anger, that turns something so intimate into something as harsh and violent as a slap. There’s no trace of tenderness in her kiss, just her tongue in his mouth and her hips grinding against his aching cock and every atom of his body blazing with the heady thrill of the forbidden. This is what he always imagined it would be like. This is what it _would_ have been like.

He tears his mouth from hers, more from a need to catch his breath than any desire to stop. Abby’s fingers tighten in his hair, cruel, and they hold each other’s gaze with something like spite, burning into each other, refusing to look away, to show weakness. Abby chest is heaving against his, her soft, ripe lips a breath away from his own.

“You know what?” she pants. “You’re a damn _hypocrite_ , Kane. You think you have me all figured out...”

Her breath hitches as he slides his hand from her waist under the hem of her shirt, caressing her bare skin.

“The truth is,” she continues, trying to maintain her composure even as his hand brushes the swell of her breast, “you can’t stand me because I see right through you. I always have. All that crap about rules and responsibilities, when really you’re just _afraid._ Afraid to take risks, afraid to take a chance on people, afraid to take what you really want.”

“The hell I am,” Marcus growls, and with a sudden movement he hooks his arms under Abby’s legs, lifting her bodily and carrying her across the room and into the adjoining bedroom. He drops her onto the bed and moves over her, pinning her between his arms, looking down at her with a hunger that he doesn’t trouble to conceal.

The look in her eyes is a reflection of his own.

“Just take what you want,” she rasps. She’s panting and flushed and it’s _glorious_ , indescribably sexy – to have the untouchable Councillor Griffin pinned beneath him, her coat crumpled around her, her hair falling out of her carefully controlled braid, not just willing but _wanting_. The heady roar of triumph rages through him, setting every nerve and sinew in his body alight, urging him in the most primal way to _take_ her, to _show_ her what it is he wants. But he holds himself back – always control, that’s the Marcus Kane he must be now. The man he was. Always in control even when he felt it was hanging by a thread.

“Not until you answer my question,” he says, his voice low and dangerous. “What do _you_ want, Abby? Me? Or just power over me? Do you just want to know that I want you?” He rolls his hips a little, grinding his erection against her, emphasising his point. “Is that what this is about?”

She lets out a helpless little sound of pure desire that nearly undoes him completely, hitching her leg around his hips and arching her body to rub herself against him. She drags his head down to crash their mouths together, tugging at his lower lip with her teeth, suddenly animalistic in a way that drives him crazy. There’s no time for any finesse, any rationality – he’s tugging her jeans and underwear down as she lifts her hips to help him, fumbling at the fastening of his own clothes, desperate to _feel_ her. Between hard, frantic kisses he can hear her breathing _yesyesyes..._ and he doesn’t know if it’s her answer or if she even knows she’s doing it.

“You want the truth, is that it?” he rasps, cradling her thigh with one hand, the other pinned by her head, holding himself above her. He’s panting now, adrenaline and lust pounding through his veins. He’s no longer sure where the pretence ends and this moment begins, which version of her he’s talking to. “You really want to know?”

He pushes into her and they both moan at the sensation, for once in perfect agreement. And then he starts to move and _god_ it’s so good he might die, and he can’t stop the words that pour from his mouth, harsh and intense, thrown like daggers into her skin.

“Of _course_ I fucking thought about it,” he growls. “Of course I sat there and imagined it when you were shooting your mouth off in Council meetings, or glaring at me when we passed each other in the corridors. Of course I lay in bed every night thinking about your lips, your hands on me, your gorgeous fucking breasts, pulling down that tight little braid of hair and winding my fingers through it, holding it as I _fucked_ you hard against the wall, hearing you scream my name. Is that what you want, Abby? Do you want to know every dirty little fantasy I had?”

He picks up the pace, thrusting into her harder, faster. Abby clutches at his back, her hands grasping handfuls of his shirt.

“Do you want to know every time I got hard when you spat my name at me like a curse?”

“ _Yes_.”

“Do you want to know how I imagined you would taste, how you would _feel_ , the sound you would make when you came?”

“I...oh _god_...”

“And you _knew.”_ He slides his hand down to where they’re joined, pressing into her slick, quivering flesh with the pad of his thumb. “You knew that I wanted you and you _liked_ it.”

She shudders and keens with pleasure as he strokes her. “Yes...yes, _oh_ right there...” she breathes. Her eyes squeeze shut, her lips trembling in an ecstatic litany. “Oh yes, god yesyes _yes_...”

Marcus stills, ignoring the faint whine of protest that falls from Abby’s lips.

“Tell me the truth,” he says, and his voice is raw, almost pleading. “No more lies to yourself, no more goddamn moral high ground. Just tell me the truth, Abby. Tell me you wanted me too.”

She opens her eyes, gazes up at him with dark, heavy lidded pleasure. “I wanted you,” she whimpers. “I _always_ wanted you. _Please...”_

Hearing her _beg_ , the breathy, high pitched tension in her voice, is more than he can bear. His control cracks and he thrusts into her urgently, deep and hard, his mouth sealing over hers again as their bodies resume the frantic rhythm that feels as natural as breathing, and as necessary, moulding together. His hands are all over her; hers are in his hair, clawing at his back, her legs wrapping round his hips, drawing him deeper...

“Tell me,” he gasps, kissing her jaw, her neck with a furious passion, peppering her delicate skin with red, angry marks. “Tell me—”

Abby lets out a sound that’s almost a sob. “I wanted...even when I hated you I _...oh...Marcus_...”

Her words dissolve into frantic, whimpering cries as he fucks her _hard_ , their clothes clinging with sweat, their hands clutching hard enough to bruise...and it’s every fantasy he ever had and _more_ , because while it’s true that he had dreamed of having her, of taking her, this is both of them _together_ , give and take...and they’re so _good_ together, he and Abby, they always have been, and the truth is that he’d never in his whole life imagined that it would be like this—

Abby’s rising cries cut off with a gasp; her whole body convulses with sudden ecstasy, and the hot pulse of her around him sends him over the edge along with her, the shuddering bliss of release blanking his mind for a sweet, infinite moment.

As his conscious brain slips back into control, Marcus feels...he doesn’t know how he feels. He only knows that he can’t look at her yet, isn’t sure what he might see in her face. He keeps his head buried in her shoulder, catching up with his breath.

“I never wanted to control you, Abby,” he murmurs, finally. He isn’t sure why it feels important to say, but it does.

“I know,” she whispers.

“I just wanted you to understand...I wanted you to _see_ me, not the person you thought I was.”

“I know.” She nudges his head from her shoulder and kisses him softly, on the lips. When he finally opens his eyes to look down at her, her familiar brown eyes are filled with warmth. “That’s what I wanted too,” she says. “We never really saw each other, did we? Back then?”

“No, we didn’t.”

He sees her now, flushed with exertion, her hair coming loose from her braid, the delicate strands around her face sticking to her damp skin. Even with the coat, the hairstyle...she doesn’t look like Councillor Griffin anymore, she just looks like Abby, _his_ Abby.

He tugs gently at the end of her braid and slips the tie off, using his fingers to unwind her hair and let it loose around her shoulders. Abby watches him without a sound, her breathing slowing to normal along with his own as he works. When he’s finished he motions for her to sit up and pulls off her coat, peeling off the layers of her clothing gently, one by one. She follows suit, and they undress each other wordlessly, pausing every now and then to capture each other’s lips in a brief, tender kiss.

Marcus couldn’t say exactly why this moment feels so important either, only that there is a profound relief that comes with the careful stripping away of the layers of their old selves. When they are both naked, clothes cast heedlessly aside to the floor for now, they slip under the covers of the bed and wrap around each other in a close embrace. Abby rests her head on his shoulder. Marcus lets his hand stroke her back gently, an instinctive gesture of comfort.

“Did you get what you wanted?” he asks softly, after a while.

“I don’t know,” says Abby.

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be.” She raises her head to kiss him tenderly on the lips, slow and sweet. “It was good,” she says, with a smile. “Really, _really_ good. It was just a little more...intense, than I had expected.”

“I guess we both got a bit caught up in the moment,” says Marcus.

“I’m glad,” says Abby. Clearly sensing his uncertainty, she sighs as she lays her head back down against his shoulder.

“I like where we are, Marcus,” she says. “But I don’t want to forget where we _were_ , either. Does that make sense? We have a... a history. A past. And it’s complicated and not all of it is pleasant but it’s a part of who we are. I don’t want to forget that.”

He takes a moment to genuinely think about this, and remembers all the things he said, all the things _she_ said, and the people they had once been. In a way, they feel like strangers.

“I don’t want to forget either,” he says. “But I don’t ever want to go back to that, Abby.”

“It wasn’t _all_ bad,” she says wryly. “It was kind of an interesting place to visit.”

Marcus shrugs, although he’s not sure how useful the gesture is while lying down. His feelings about how this went down are too complicated to easily parse right now. He’s exhausted, thoroughly satisfied, triumphant and faintly guilty in equal measure.

After some time Abby says: “Do you wish we had actually done that, back then?”

“You mean said all those things to each other?”

“No...I mean the rest.”

“Oh.” He’s surprised at the question, more so that she seems unusually shy in asking it. “Do you?” he asks.

“It might have helped. Cleared some of the tension, maybe.”

Marcus considers this. It’s true that this has felt like a release in more ways than one, and perhaps it was, after all, a more necessary thing for them than he had realised when Abby first suggested it. Even so...

“No,” he says finally. “It wouldn’t have meant anything, back then. I didn’t love you. It would have been...no, I’m glad nothing happened.”

Abby is silent for a very long time.

“You’re very sweet sometimes, you know,” she says.

He’s not sure what to make of that, so he doesn’t reply. Abby shifts slightly; kisses the bare skin of his shoulder, nuzzling her way up to kiss his jawline before claiming his lips again in a gentle, almost lazy way. It still takes Marcus by surprise, just a little, every time she kisses him. Even when he was deeply mired in hopeless longing for her, he had imagined what it would be like to kiss Abby countless times but never really thought of _her_ kissing _him_. It still seems fantastic to him, that she would want to. That she seems to enjoy touching him, holding him, being with him as much as he does her. His own desire is very familiar to him, but he is still learning to believe and understand hers.

When they part, Abby makes a soft little sound that could almost be amusement, as she settles back down into his embrace. “It’s strange, kissing you without a beard,” she says.

“Strange good or strange bad?” he asks.

“Just different.”

“It’ll grow back,” Marcus says peacefully. “Just give it time.”

 

* * *

 


End file.
